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The Black Swan: read vs. unread books
Should your library consist mostly of read books, or of unread books? The avid and loyal MR reader will already know we are adjusting for "number of books read" in posing this query.
If you own mostly read books, you use your library for reference and remembrance. Your collection is like Proust's madeleine. If you own mostly unread books, your library yields exciting discovery but also lots of clunkers. Each step to the shelf offers a chance to redefine your life and your loves in unexpected ways, or perhaps crashing disappointment.
My (small) personal library is virtually 100 percent already read books, plus Gone With the Wind and Shantaram, both of which I am saving up for long plane trips to distant climes. But I think of my real library as the local public library, which is still mostly unread books.
If you are one of those Austrian economists who believes in the all-importance of unquantifiable Knightian uncertainty, I hope your shelves are full of unread books (we now, by the way, have the means to make this otherwise murky concept operational). Otherwise you are livin' a dirty, stinkin' lie. Karmic retribution will be swift and, yes, certain.
For further musings on this topic, see Nassim Taleb's new The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable, a stimulating look at surprise.
Boo!
Posted by Tyler Cowen on February 25, 2007 at 07:16 AM in Books | Permalink
Comments
I always have said that the shelf reflects the self.
Posted by: Amber at Feb 25, 2007 8:52:11 AM
And when you do not know how to talk about your unread books, there is always bluff: http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/article1334436.ece
Posted by: kurt at Feb 25, 2007 9:29:01 AM
ORLY? Don't be shy, how do you measure Knightian uncertainty? Ref?
Posted by: eric at Feb 25, 2007 9:43:43 AM
I'm sure I would be seen as being "masked behind an explosion of aspiration" but I enjoy buying cheap old books from Amazon in my field of interest not only without having read them but but often without having read the back covers or reviews, possibly having found them in a footnote from another book, or citation someplace, possibly just finding them by searching on title keywords.
That's how you find new and interesting books! Unless you spend all day at the library or in bookstores, you'll otherwise only run into the popular books that your friends and colleagues know about. How will you discover the unknown gems?
So, because this has become somewhat of an addiction, I indeed have shelves full of as-yet-unread books. But a) Nobody ever sees them and those who do already know me, so they won't be getting the wrong impression and I'll happily tell them which I have so far read. and b) they are excellent as reference texts until I have the chance to read them cover to cover and then again thereafter.
Some turn out to be less worthwhile than others but I am rarely so disappointed as to wish I hadn't bothered buying them and eventually I will read them all - in any case its not a very expensive habit since I buy them used for cheap on Amazon.
Posted by: liberty at Feb 25, 2007 10:34:24 AM
I found Shantaram utterly amazing - congratulations on still having that ahead of you. I read most of it sitting on the balcony of a hotel in the Austrian Alps last summer getting over the aftereffects of a dose of flu, while my wife and son went off walking. Am currently greatly enjoying *Red Earth And Pouring Rain*, Vikram Chandra's first, after I first heard of hm when you recommended *Sacred Games*. Thanks.
Posted by: Alan Little at Feb 25, 2007 11:21:31 AM
"I read most of it sitting on the balcony of a hotel in the Austrian Alps last summer getting over the aftereffects of a dose of flu, while my wife and son went off walking."
wow, that reminds me of "The Magic Mountain", by Mann.
I've heard great things about Shantaram
Posted by: Jeff Jones at Feb 25, 2007 12:30:21 PM
Nassim Taleb is definitely one of my favorites, but I just can't seem to grasp his hatred of the field of economics. For such a sharp person, his arguments concerning the economics orthodoxy are largely empty.
Still, Fooled by Randomness and Dynamic Hedging are two definite classics.
Posted by: Chris at Feb 25, 2007 12:53:52 PM
I've never really understood the whole "I buy books that I never read" phenomenon.
I go to the bookstore, pick out half a dozen books that look interesting, skim through them to narrow it down to one or two, and read about halfway through those before i walk to the checkout counter. After I buy them, they usually get read within a few weeks.
Sure, there are people who have less time to devote to reading than I do, but I would imagine that they simply buy fewer books, rather than buying the same number but using them for decoration.
Posted by: Bergamot at Feb 25, 2007 2:28:18 PM
Um, not to sound clueless, but what does believing in Knightian uncertainty have to do with it? I realize it was said with tongue in cheek to some extent, but still, it seems a complete non sequitur to me.
Posted by: Maestro at Feb 25, 2007 4:35:53 PM
If you don't know the probability of getting a good unknown book...
Posted by: liberty at Feb 25, 2007 4:37:12 PM
"Should your library consist mostly of read books, or of unread books?"
Turn the "should" into "does" and I can answer that easily. Mostly unread.
Buying a book is a bit like bookmarking a webpage. Part of what you're doing is making a note to yourself. If you buy to read, then "read this", or if you buy because you might read, then "maybe read this". Instead of buying the book you could create a list, constructing a "virtual library".
I buy books intending to read them, and then typically (with exceptions) I don't get around to reading them. I have a library now of books that are pretty interesting and that I don't regret buying since I have a feeling I'll be reading them at some point, but however interesting they are, I'm usually marginally more interested new books (i.e., new to me). Roughly speaking, my reading list is "last in, first out".
If someone else buys me a book, then it lingers near the front of the "last in, first out" set of books. I feel a duty to read it, enough of a duty that I count it as something that I should read after I read one or two other books. But it tends to say in the number two or three spot of my reading list, however many books I read.
Posted by: Constant at Feb 25, 2007 5:32:14 PM
I fully intend to read every book I buy. Whether life affords me the opportunity varies from book to book. Taleb's book is on my to-read list. It probably won't make it to the top for another year.
Posted by: squik at Feb 25, 2007 5:36:27 PM
Yes, I second what Constant says as well except that I sadly almost never books lent or given me. They just rarely strike me as interesting as those I pick out for myself - I have the best taste in the world of course!
Posted by: liberty at Feb 25, 2007 6:53:49 PM
Salut
Je ne peux pas écrire dans une langue vivante le dimanche (pour des raisons sentimentales) mais vous n’aurez pas de problèmes grâce au fameux
L’idée de la bibliothèque est ici.
www.fooledbyrandomness.com/eco.pdf
Ciao tutti.
Posted by: nassim at Feb 25, 2007 7:58:01 PM
Salut
Je ne peux pas écrire dans une langue vivante le dimanche (pour des raisons sentimentales) mais vous n’aurez pas de problèmes grâce au fameux "google translator"
L’idée de la bibliothèque est ici.
www.fooledbyrandomness.com/eco.pdf
Ciao tutti.
Posted by: nassim at Feb 25, 2007 7:58:48 PM
The cost of books should also matters. The unread-to-read ratio has definitely gone up for me since I discovered a small room in my neighborhood library that sells used paperback for 50 cents each, and hardcover, $1. Vanity factors aside, there is positive option value to live with books. Every now and then, I also feel under the pressure to live up to my cheaply-filled-up bookshelf.
Posted by: Yan Li at Feb 25, 2007 8:41:40 PM
"Nassim Taleb is definitely one of my favorites, but I just can't seem to grasp his hatred of the field of economics."
I just can't grasp why having read Taleb one would continue in the field of mainstream economics. But I guess that is the sunk cost bias ;-).
Also, I think the point Taleb is making is that we think we are smarter than we really are. The more we are confronted with the knowledge we don't have the humbler we might be about what we think we know about the real world.
That seems to be his problem with mainstream econ. It also seems to me to be a central indictment of much of the blogosphere, where posters and commenters are the more certain among the population, and I assume in Talebian terms the more dangerous.
But then again, I'm just not sure at all. Perhaps I should read more.
Posted by: knackeredhack at Feb 26, 2007 1:07:04 PM
Well, then my Amazon wish list is part of my library. I simply transfer it from Amazon to my bookshelves two days before I plan to actually read the book.
Posted by: speedwell at Feb 28, 2007 12:59:37 PM
大家好，我是臺灣人，從臺灣一個人搬家來到美國，環境很陌生，感覺很孤單。以前在臺灣幾家知名的徵信社工作過，我是一個優秀的徵信工作者，希望早點找到適合自己的工作。希望通過貴站，認識更多的朋友。
Posted by: 謝文豪 at Apr 1, 2008 9:44:08 PM
"But then again, I'm just not sure at all. Perhaps I should read more."
- knackeredhack
Taleb would likely tell you to read less. He does. For example he abjures newspapers. But _do_ read "The Black Swan".
Posted by: tndal at Jun 28, 2008 1:53:39 AM
"But then again, I'm just not sure at all. Perhaps I should read more."
- knackeredhack
Taleb would likely tell you to read less. He does. For example he abjures newspapers. But _do_ read "The Black Swan".
Posted by: tndal at Jun 28, 2008 1:54:08 AM
Posted by: at Oct 22, 2008 10:05:57 PM
